The inevitable Hunger Games thread

What are the odds that the same actress would play two squirrel-killing, Appalachian dwelling, look out for her sibling' 'cause her mom is no use sorts in two very different movies based on two very different books?

― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, March 24, 2012 7:16 PM (26 minutes ago)

lol, was talking to a hunger games fan today and I started describing winter's bone, got halfway thru before realizing they're the same character

in the book, the District citizens are forced to watch the Hunger Games telecast in order to further grind them down; when they talk about "ratings" i think they're just talking about the Capitol viewers. some people have said (and i agree) that it kind of doesn't make sense that "you sit there and watch your children die" = a cowed populace, because if anything is going to inspire you to rebel, it's your children dying, right? idk.

it's also a little cheap that these Games have been going on for 74 years, but no tribute has ever tried to kill the assholes sitting ten feet away judging their use of weaponry, and apparently there's no contingency plan in place for tributes becoming suicidal. in the book they were like "don't do anything stupid or they'll kill your whole family," but even with that caveat i have to believe SOMEONE has tried it in the past 74 years.

Doesn't Donald Sutherland offer some blather about giving the people some hope being better than simply executing a few kids every year? Regardless, didn't buy for a sec that anyone would stand for this silly arrangement for more than a year or two, sci-fi dystopia or not. Maybe the movie needed a more explicit show of government force to demonstrate the power of The Man?

Also agreed that I wish that one other team wasn't composed entirely of dicks and bullies. It would have added a bit more moral ambiguity had they been at least a little sympathetic, and not, you know, actively encouraged you to root for their deaths.

Some things from the book that may have given context - I was lead to believe that the games were more or less mandatory viewing for the citizens - the people in the Capitol never have entrants, so it's all fun for them, but punishment for the other districts because of the rebellion.

I thought that losing Katniss' narration did mean that the movie would be more confusing for those who hadn't read the book. Katniss' salute to Prue's district happens in the second(?) book - that was a bit out of place. It *does* raise a scandal among the game makers that she places all the flowers on Rue - she thinks they'll edit it out for reminding the viewers that they are people, children, etc.

The sponsorships they receive during the games are said to be quite expensive. We saw Haumitch schmooze but it might have been more helpful to hear Jim pushing for donations! A big thing in the book is that after Rue and Thrush died, the people from their district sent Katniss a loaf of bread (which was distinct enough she knew it came from them). This touches her a great deal because she knows that must have been a great expense and an unheard of cross-district sign of support.

I thought it would be more interesting if Katniss had to, at some point in the story, fight someone who wasn't obviously a "bad guy" (ie those 1st-2nd district peeps). Seemed the relatively good or morally neutral people were killed off by some combination of nature/show manipulation/bad guys.

yeah i did think a lot of the deaths were very convenient for katniss to retain her moral high ground - she only outright kills the dude who killed rue and that's presented as purely reactive self-defence. (and i think the bad guy at the end, but he's being torn apart by hounds anyway.) even in her only one-on-one fight, someone else handily shows up to kill the girl who attacks her.

The great thing about sci-fi is that it can show us stuff like a reality TV program being manipulative with the situation it's presenting and viewers learning to take less than entirely trusting view of this, when in reality it would take thousands of years for this to evolve.

also isn't the point the multiple allegories - we might throw our hands up and say "how can they possibly accept this barbarity" but almost every aspect of the hunger games society is a direct reflection of stuff that has happened or is happening in real human history - just smooshed together to magnify the horror

One thing that the film I think drops is the fact that the district that wins gets like double its food rations for the next year, so for the subsidence districts, that's nearly life-or-death for a lot of them. Peeta's talk about how if no-one watched, that would really fuck'em up is veering close to "Workers Control the Means of Production!" - which is obviously one of the things I love about the film, that since the book has been written, the OWS has brought particular topicality to it.

One thing I'm curious about is what else the people at home watch - like is the rest of the programming Panem's Next Top Garishly Coloured Model, or Food Tips for Bark and Small Rodents? Or is that the only thing actually broadcast all year?

I was pretty certain (but maybe wrong) that they dealt with the sponsorships? You have Woody Harrelson in the train car talking about how you have to get sponsors to get you stuff like fire and cover, and you have to be likable to get them (the scene where he advises Katniss to keep the knife, as Peeta is much better at glad-handing than her), and later you have that Woody looking worried / Woody slapping backs and shaking hands / package for Peeta montage.

Also agreed that I wish that one other team wasn't composed entirely of dicks and bullies.

Team 11 = Rue and Thrash (the big guy who offs the knife-thrower) did alright, and you could imagine that some of the dudes who last ~10 secs were nice if you met them in a social setting.

But yeah, I think Katniss gets her chance in the early-game scene where she meets Foxface in the forest and they just run in separate directions - her plan is much more "Survive with my appalachian skills" than "kill everyone".

Or she gets her high moral ground from her high district number :)

Just because it was depicted subtly doesn't mean anyone would miss the gist of viscous blood spraying across the screen or bloody weapons being bashed about.

This was the weird thing - I think the scene where Rue dies is pretty much the only bloody weapon!

they covered the sponsorships - i guess i'd have just enjoyed seeing a rich capitol sponsor being ~moved~ by the showmance and deciding to send them medicine because of it - could've been a pretty effective scene.

they covered why some of the kids were "baddies" too, ie the ones from the richer districts are trained for it from an early age (hence "careers") and traditionally ally with each other at the start. obviously it suits suzanne collins' purpose that katniss is only ever put in a position of having to fight the careers, rather than eg if she and rue had succeeded in eliminating them first and were left as the last two themselves.

i was reading ahead and some of the winning tributes who crop up later in the series have pretty interesting strategies - eg there's one who spends her time in training weeping and acting weak and deliberately gets a low score so no one thinks she's a threat (which is why katniss was targeted more than foxface in this film) - then hides for most of the games then reveals herself to be fairly good at killing right at the end.

All I know is that the Hunger Games, the TV show, must be the most boring required viewing ever. Like when Katniss is asleep for two days? Or Team Asshole is just camping by the river or whatever? Not riveting.

So my wife told me that when things like the killer dogs and whatnot happen in the book, you don't know they're the TV show's doing, since it's all Katniss POV.

i'm sure if katniss and rue were the last two katniss would kill herself though. it never really deals with the moment allies have to turn into enemies -- that would've been real interesting from the baddie crowd. (and again, if cato and the rest of them were turned into roy batty figures instead of just that disposable "this is all i know how to do!!" line, they would've gotten some humanity to them. maybe the book humanizes them more.)

one thing i liked is that katniss isn't some magical hero-who-sees-the-light figure (in this book at least). i'm always prepared for the young hero to make silly "CAN'T YOU SEE WHAT THEY'RE DOING TO US!?!?" monologues and then destroying the system, but nope. no matter how heroic and goodhearted she is, she's still just another kid playing their game.

All I know is that the Hunger Games, the TV show, must be the most boring required viewing ever. Like when Katniss is asleep for two days? Or Team Asshole is just camping by the river or whatever? Not riveting.

lol josh you can easily sub in big brother w/r/t this complaint and yet that era happened to us!

(and again, if cato and the rest of them were turned into roy batty figures instead of just that disposable "this is all i know how to do!!" line, they would've gotten some humanity to them. maybe the book humanizes them more.)

i understand the sequels feature former "career" tributes in more depth, so maybe that happens then

One thing I'm curious about is what else the people at home watch - like is the rest of the programming Panem's Next Top Garishly Coloured Model, or Food Tips for Bark and Small Rodents? Or is that the only thing actually broadcast all year?

(MILD SPOILER)There's a whole thing in Mockingjay about the propaganda aired regarding District 13.

BTW, I'm kind of fascinated that Jennifer Lawrence has become this lightning rod for body politics. Like, people calling her too "big boned" or whatever for this role. And then I just read (and maybe this is old news) that the reason she did that skeezy Esquire spread was to prove to apparently many doubters that she could be sexual post-"Winter's Bone," which is what got her the "X-Men" role, which surely helped her land this tentpole opportunity. Just weird all around, and kind of cruel, this oddly Zeitgeisty debate. Lawrence does "Winter's Bone" and people say she can't be hot. Then she does "Hunger Games," and people call her fat. I'm worried she's either going to be a tough as nails adult or go off the deep end.

"Almost all of the boys and at least half of the girls are bigger than I am, even though many of the tributes have never been fed properly. ... I may be smaller naturally, but overall my family's resourcefulness has given me an edge in that area. I stand straight, and while I'm thin, I"m strong. The meat and plants from the woods combined with the exertion it took to get them have given me a healthier body than most of those I see around me."

Xp I feel there was some mention of fat people=rich, thin people=poor, but Katniss is also a hunter! She/her family get by fairly well between that and the many extra times her name is in the draw for grain, so her (very tiny, model thin with boobs) size is pretty reasonable. Of course I'm a fat old lady so what do I know. She runs pretty well for Hollywood Obese :*(

So basically Katniss in the book is a typical late bloomer girl, sort of skinny and awkward? Regardless, it's not like she looks like some hulk in the movie. Maybe they should have given her mountain teeth again?

Never read the book, but there's a literal-mindedness of that paragraph that does scan weird. "My family's resourcefulness has given me an edge in that area" just doesn't sound like anything anyone would ever say or think. It's like what someone pointed out way upthread with some character exclaiming "OMG, killer mutant bees genetically engineered by the government!" Like, everyone would know what they are so they don't need to be described except for the sake of the reader. Same with that "I am thin but stand straight, for I have foraged and eaten healthily" stuff.

the whole book is like that. just plain, lifeless, over-explanatory prose. collins seems like the type of writer who would have to be convinced not to write exact mathematical measurements of things in lieu of actually describing them.

you'll have to overlook the "high schooler writing for huffpo" thing, but this is a pretty interesting article. i was joking before about "making katniss white" but i had no idea that there's been a lot of debate over her race within the fandom. lawrence was great, but it would've been good to see a POC in that role.

i had no idea it was steve reich! that was the best bit of the film, gave me high hopes about the rest of the Games scenes, but alas.

xp to lex: i'm not sure it's relevant to mention the actual geography in relation to today's demographics. i don't know what year the book takes place in but it sounds like centuries have passed since north america was a thing. following current trends you'd expect there to be much much fewer white people throughout the entire country regardless of where different racial demos are concentrated (though you'd expect that to change too).

But the rest of “The Hunger Games” is pretty much a disaster—disjointed, muffled, and even, at times, boring. Collins herself labored on the script, along with Gary Ross and Billy Ray, and Ross (“Pleasantville,” “Seabiscuit”) directed. Working with the cinematographer Tom Stern, Ross shoots in a style that I have come to despise. A handheld camera whips nervously from one angle to another; the fragments are then jammed together without any regard for space. You feel like you’ve been tossed into a washing machine (don’t sit in the front rows without Dramamine). Even when two people are just talking calmly, Ross jerks the camera around. Why? As the sense of danger increases, he has nothing to build toward. Visually, he’s already gone over the top. And the action itself is a thrashing, incoherent blur—kids tumbling on the ground or wrestling with each other. Katniss stalks various kids with her bow and arrow, but she kills only one intentionally—a domineering sadist—and you don’t see the arrow hit him; you don’t even see him fall. Ross consistently drains away all the tensions built into the grisly story—the growing wariness and suspicion that each teen-ager must feel as the number of those still alive begins to diminish, or the horror (or glee) that some of them experience as they commit murder. The camera rushes through the wilderness, but, in the end, the movie looks less like a fight to the death than like a scavenger hunt. Katniss is always finding something useful in a tree or lying on the ground.